In addition to the immersive art experience, Artopia will offer guests hand-crafted cocktails, shaken and stirred by the city’s most respected bartenders. A curated selection of Los Angeles’ hottest food trucks will on hand to enhance the evening by selling their signature dishes to hungry art aficionados. Last, but not least, new to Artopia this year is a special area devoted to vendors and artists who are showcasing and selling unique and handcrafted art and gift items. Produced by WeAreDLTA (a collaboration between Edgar Varela andMelissa Richardson Banks), the event’s first Artisan Village features an invited group of only 20 vendors.

Admission is limited to only 1,500 guests so buy your tickets NOW while they are still available and still only $30 (prices go up weekly until the event is sold out!)

Make your way to the first ever POPUP Marketplace at L.A. LIVE on November 12 from 5 – 10PM for an evening of shopping all things local and handmade. The district will transform into a night time craft fair showcasing over 60 of LA’s best and brightest indie makers, crafters and artists. DJs will be spinning tunes while you hop from booth to booth and participating L.A. LIVE restaurants will offer food and drink specials so you can relax and unwind with all of your new wares. With the holidays just around the corner, it’s the perfect excuse to get some early shopping done whilst sneaking in a treat (or two) for yourself!

Stop by our info booth on the way in and be one of the first 300 early birds to receive a complimentary POPUP tote bag!

We’re no longer accepting vendor submissions for the November 12 event. If you would like to be added to our mailing list to receive information about our next event, please emailedgar@edgarvarela.com.

Dark Nights is coming back in a bigger and better way on Friday, October 3! With the same awesome $5 food and drink deals, $5 parking and even more live entertainment, this is the best night for locals to be at L.A. LIVE!

$5 Parking All Night (Free for Downtown Preferred members) Parking for Dark Nights is only in the West Garage, Gate B. Only cash accepted.
40% Off Team LA Store (5-9pm) Some restrictions may apply. See store for details.

DUBLAB ’15TH ANNIVERSARY’ CELEBRATION

The party, happening exactly 15 years to the date and hour we started broadcasting, will feature live music performances, DJ sets, film projections, custom t-shirt screen-printing, food trucks and art installations

L.A. LIVE presents DARK NIGHTS bringing you the best nights in town, the “dark nights”. Dark Nights are historically “dark” for L.A. LIVE with no other major events happening at L.A. LIVE which means these are the BEST nights to hit up L.A. LIVE for a night out in DTLA. No traffic, inexpensive parking and simply a great time.

DARK NIGHTS is a celebration at L.A. LIVE representing the Downtown community, local beats and culture.

L.A. Weekly is excited to confirm the artist lineup for this year’s Artopia! Taking place Thursday, May 15 from 7 to 11 p.m. at Grand Central Market, this year’s Artopia will focus on L.A.’s vibrant arts and culture scene, with a special focus on downtown, as well as celebrate the L.A. Weekly’s People Issue.

Curated by art critic (and L.A. Weekly contributor) Shana Nys Dambrot, this year’s Artopia features live mural painting by artists HUEMAN, Jim Mahfood and Jason Shawn Alexander, sculptural installations by Ramiro Gomez, a 3D Blacklight Experience from Debi Cable as well as a high-fashion peep show from the Bohemian Society featuring special guests Alexey Steele, Mika Mae Jones, Tyson Lee Smyer, Cielo Garcia, Kaylani Lei and Annie Cruz. Creative collective dublab will be curating a music installation including multiple DJ stations and performances. The Peach Kings and The Record Company will be performing live.

Curator Shana Nys Dambrot describes the vision of Artopia as experiential, saying: “We are entranced by the allure of experience. Art is a visual language, of course; but art, like life, is much more than pictures. Artopia is a place where art is everything and everything is art — painting, yes of course, and fashion (especially fashion), architecture, bustling crowds, film, food, open bars and dance music. Society is a fantastic spectacle of simultaneity, immersion, transgression, beauty, history, surprise, decadence, and most importantly, other people. And since we gather to celebrate the new People Issue, for Artopia we’ve assembled a family of performers, models, painters, designers, technicians, and deejays to weave a multi-sensory experience of after-hours culture in an historic location, with freehand mural-making, interactive projections, peep shows, body-printing, sculptural installations, and living dolls — all with a particular nod to the seduction of the handmade and the extravagances of the people who make downtown L.A. a haven for the urban avant-garde.”

General admission tickets are $30 and include entrance to the event as well as wine and beer. For more information and updates on Artopia and more information on the participating artists, check out laweekly.com/artopia

Taste, shop, sample and learn while supporting the local economy and local artisanal vendors at our seasonal shows and pop-up shops.Artisanal LA is a pop-up community event with weekend long seasonal shows and shops celebrating the city’s finest local, sustainable and handmade edibles.

Artisanal LA showcases the best artisanal food vendors around the country. Attendees shop a wide array of edible treats from butchers to chocolate makers, and enjoy programming like hands-on workshops, chef-led demos, expert panels and speakers educating guests on various food related topics as well as the opportunity to learn about non-profit organizations changing the local food scene in Los Angeles.

Attendees have the rare chance to shop from nearly 100 hand-selected food and beverage artisans at our seasonal shows. Meet up-and-coming food and drink vendors who share a passion for healthy, local, and sustainable ingredients. Many of our artisans aren’t yet accessible through retail stores or even through farmers markets. The exciting two-day shopping event makes it easy for you to buy local, support LA’s economy, discover new favorites, get a jump on holiday shopping, and join in community while having a ball. 100% of our vendors’ products are made right here in Southern California with local and sustainable goods. Spend the weekend with the growing number of Angelenos who want to know where their food comes from and how to live a healthy and locally sustainable life!

Paris Photo was created in 1996 and is the most prestigious art fair dedicated to historical and contemporary photography. This fair takes place annually at the Grand Palais in Paris mid-November and at theParamount Pictures Studios in Los Angeles at the end of April.

Paris Photo Los Angeles, the US edition of the world’s most celebrated art fair for works created in the photographic medium, will take place at Paramount Pictures Studios April 25th-27th offering the ideal setting to explore how artists have been and are using photography and moving image in their work in the 20th and 21st centuries.

Leading international galleries will present historical and contemporary bodies of works by renowned and emerging artists in the legendary Paramount Pictures’ soundstages. The New York Street Backlot, the one-of-a-kind replica of New York City’s streets, will be dedicated to the presentation of cutting-edge solo shows, Young Gallery exhibitions, and bookseller projects, each exhibiting within an exclusive movie set.

The public program is also an important component of the fair. Built around cultural events involving artists, art world professionals, collectors, and cultural institutions, this year’s program will include special exhibitions and the Sound & Vision series of conversations and screenings.

“MUSE-ings: Snapshots of the Arts District”

Book Launch Event – Jan. 18th – 7-11pm

Photos & Artwork
Inspired by the Images

Jan. 18 – Feb. 8 Art Share LA, 801 E. 4th Pl
Downtown LA, 90013

One of Los Angeles’ most popular neighborhoods, the Downtown Arts District, is revealed and celebrated in a new book of photographs by Melissa Richardson Banks, “MUSE-ings: Snapshots of the Arts District,” and in an exhibition featuring the photographs with artworks by over 40 artists inspired by the images.

A book launch event and exhibit opening will be held Saturday, January 18 @ 7 p.m. to 11 p.m., at the Warehouse Gallery of Art Share L.A., 801 E. 4th Place, Los Angeles. The exhibit will be on view through February 8. A closing reception and book signing will be held Saturday, February 8 @ 7 p.m. to 11 p.m. Admission is free. Gallery hours are 11 a.m. to 2 p.m. Wednesdays through Fridays and 12 p.m. to 5 p.m. on Saturdays. Proceeds from artwork and book sales benefit Art Share L.A., a nonprofit community center (www.artsharela.org).

Captured and shared daily through her “Downtown Muse” blog and social media postings, the photographs by Richardson Banks reveal an insider’s view of the Arts District, which was transformed in the 1980s by artists who created studios in former industrial warehouses and is now in the midst of yet another major renaissance.
As characterized by airbnb.com, “Color spills from every surface among one of the city’s favorite neighborhood canvases, Los Angeles’ Arts District. Insatiable creative energy and unstoppable trendiness emanate from the walls of its swiftly repurposing warehouse spaces and industrial-inspired artists’ lofts. Galleries, studios, and connoisseurs of coffee, cocktails, and challenging concepts crowd into this unmistakably painted bastion for incoming artists and fresh-faced visionaries.”
Richardson Banks’ point of view in her photos chronicling this extraordinary community is more like someone admiring a loved one, rather than documenting a neighborhood. Images include a pile of colorfully painted bricks covered in graffiti from a demolished industrial building, luscious blossoms against stark concrete, bold skies crisscrossed by power lines, serpentine wire caressing iron fences, and sunlight washing over historic bridges. These are among the many images that evoke the sense of a place more pastoral or exotic than what one expects to find in the center of the nation’s second largest metropolis.

“I’m not longing for the past as much as I am appreciating the present and hoping for the future,” says Richardson Banks. “Since rapid changes are in the making, I feel compelled to capture what moments I can so I don’t forget a thing.”

Together with 50 photographs from the book, the MUSE-ings exhibition features over 45 works of art inspired by Richardson Banks’ images and created by artists, many of who follow the photographer’s blog online. “I’m especially inspired by art and artists because of my surroundings,” she says, “so it was natural for me to involve people whose work I love and admire by sharing their creativity through this exhibition.”

Using one or more photographs as inspiration, the artists created their own interpretation and incorporated their artistic license to create unique works of art. The exhibit features narrative and representational art utilizing a variety of styles including impressionism, surrealism, abstract and outsider. The work represents a wide range of media including paintings using oil, spray paint, watercolor and/or acrylic, mixed-media prints and drawings, as well as sculptural installations, neon, and more.

For more information about “MUSE-ings,” visitwww.downtownmuse.com. Art Share L.A. is a community art center that is a sanctuary for the arts and their creators, providing 30 live/work units and 14,000 sq. ft of creative space in Downtown Los Angeles. Stay tuned on Facebook/ArtShareLA. For questions, please email info@artsharela.org.

EXHIBIT: “MUSE-ings: Snapshots of the Arts District,” featuring 50 photographs from the book, as well as work by 41 L.A. artists inspired by the images, is on view January 18 through February 8 at the Warehouse Gallery of Art Share L.A., 801 E. 4th Place, Los Angeles. Free. Info at www.artsharela.org.Saturday, January 18 @ 7 p.m. to 11 p.m. Launch party for the book and opening reception for the exhibit. Free.Saturday, February 8 @ 7 p.m. to 11 p.m. Closing reception and book signing. Free.

EVENTS:Thursday, February 13, Melissa Richardson Banks is the featured artist in the Downtown Art Walk’s Art Walk Lounge at 634 S. Spring Street, Los Angeles. Books and prints will be available for sale.

Melissa Richardson Banks is our secret eyes, finding the secret light that illuminates the secrets of an ever-changing neighborhood and bringing them out into plain sight so that they are secrets no more. ~ Cheech Marin, collector, art advocate and entertainer

Melissa Richardson Banks offers a poignant long-form photo-essay chronicling the changing contours of a singular place and time. Her taste for saturated color is met by the neighborhood’s organic proliferation of street art and industrial palimpsests. Her instinct for painterly detail appreciates the way rail tracks or light posts recede just so, the way the sun paints the sky and myriad reflections paint each other, and the peculiar architectural romance of the moribund manufacturing sector. In the tradition of classic street-photographers like Eugène Atget and Henri Cartier-Bresson, her images capture a specific sense of place that looks like poetry, but does the job of documentary. Her unerring eye for the rhythms of her environment approaches the power of, if not nature exactly, then the thing that people like us chooses instead of nature. ~ Shana Nys Dambrot – art critic, Whitehot Magazine

Great artists have flocked to Tumblr to share their work for the digital world to see. Unfortunately, those creative minds usually forget about Tumblr within a few weeks after creating it. That’s why Melissa Richardson Banks’ online anthology of downtown Los Angeles’ Art District, Downtown Muse, is such a treat. Richardson Banks shares her “fly-on-the-wall” view of street scenes and local stories a couple times a day. Every day. And if you want to get the offline experience of her Tumblr, she offers free neighborhood tours weekly. ~ Judge, 2013 LA Weekly Web Award.

MUSE-ings: Snapshots of the Arts District, Downtown Los Angeles is a new book that features Downtown Muse’s signature “on-the-fly” narrative images depicting her fast-changing urban neighborhood. Slated for nationwide distribution in January 2014, a limited number of advance copies and prints are available for sale NOW just in time for the holidays.

Captured and shared daily, her photographs are intended to give an insider’s glimpse into the Arts District, which was transformed in the 1980s by artists who created studios in former industrial warehouses and is now in the midst of yet another major renaissance, complete with new restaurants, bars, coffeehouses, retail stores, condo lofts, and more.

It’s been said that her point of view seems more like someone admiring a loved one than a tourist taking photos on vacation. A pile of colorfully painted bricks covered in graffiti from a demolished industrial building, luscious blossoms against stark concrete, blinding rooftop sunsets, bold skies crisscrossed by power lines, serpentine wire twirled around iron fences, and the promise of a new day as the sun rises over historic bridges are among the many images that evoke the sense of a place more pastoral or even more exotic than what you’d expect to find in the center of the nation’s second largest metropolitan area.

The book includes 92 full-color photographs and an introductory essay. It was designed by art director Christy Addis who began collecting low-res images for personal enjoyment months prior to knowing her. Shortly after she did, out of the blue, Addis emailed Richardson Banks a draft layout of images, suggesting that we collaborate on a book.

MUSE-ings: Snapshots of the Arts District, Downtown Los Angeles is sold online through the Downtown Muse blog and distributed through Amazon.com and other retail outlets. The hardcover book retails for $25 plus tax and shipping. While the official release date for the book is Wednesday, January 15, 2014, a limited number of advance copies and prints are available for purchase in time for the holidays.

“BUY THE BOOK – GET A PRINT” HOLIDAY SPECIAL: Through December 31, 2013, purchase a book AND receive a FREE print! (Restrictions apply. Book must be bought from Melissa Richardson Banks either in person or here online at http://www.downtownmuse.com for the full $25 retail price plus tax and shipping. Valued at $25, the unframed borderless 8″ print will be selected from the four images below by the photographer and accompanied by a gift envelope. Order by December 15, 2013 to ensure delivery by Christmas!)

To purchase books, click HERE. You can also buy online on Amazon (NOTE: Purchases made through Amazon are not eligible for my “Buy a Book – Get a Print” Holiday Special). Need assistance with a purchase or have questions about wholesale or bulk orders? Call me at (213) 537-4483 or email me by clicking HERE.

BOOKSIGNINGS & ART EVENTS: Want a signed book or print? Bookmark this page for updates and be sure to sign up for my mailing list HERE!

“THE INSTAGRAM SHOW: Celebrating the Art of the Camera Phone” at Melrose Lightspace:Two photographs from MUSE-ings: Snapshots of the Arts District, Downtown Los Angeles are included in this juried exhibition, which features a diverse selection of more than 100 images selected from all over the world. Admission to the three-day event is free. Hours are Thursday, December 5 from 6 PM to 9 PM; Friday, December 6 from 12 noon to 11 PM (artist reception at 7-11 PM); and Saturday, December 7 from 12 noon to 11 PM. Melrose Lightspace is located at 7600 Melrose Ave. Ste. N, Los Angeles, CA 90046. Information online at www.instagramshowla.com and www.melroselightspace.net.

ROMERO STUDIO XMAS ART SHOW & SALE at Plaza de la Raza:Prints and a limited number of advance copies of MUSE-ings: Snapshots of the Arts District, Downtown Los Angeles will be for sale on Saturday, December 7 from 7 PM to 12 midnight and Sunday, December 8 from 12 noon to 6 PM. This year’s show and sale will be held in Plaza’s Boathouse Gallery (3540 N. Mission Rd., Los Angeles, CA 90031). Information online atwww.plazadelaraza.org and www.romerostudio.net.

BIOS

ABOUT THE PHOTOGRAPHER & AUTHOR: Melissa Richardson Banks refrains from calling herself as a photographer, but she plays one most every day in the Arts District of Downtown Los Angeles. During her daily walks with her dogs Vatche and Foxy, she often takes unplanned photographs with an iPhone. A native of Texas, she’s an adopted Angeleno who was drawn to the Arts District 20 years ago since its industrial feel and close-knit creative community reminded her of where she grew up in Flour Bluff. To earn a living and inspiring other parts of her life, she runs a marketing firm called of CauseConnect, which helps businesses and nonprofits work well together to change the world. She also shares photos, stories, and information about the Arts District through her Downtown Muse website and social media (her Tumblr blog won a 2013 LA Weekly Web Award!). Her artistic side is satisfied by managing the Chicano art collection of Cheech Marin, producing museum exhibitions and publishing art books for others, and, of course, taking snapshots.

ABOUT THE BOOK DESIGNER & ART DIRECTOR: Christy Addis was leaving Los Angeles right about the time Melissa Richardson Banks was arriving. Nights of performing in the Arts District’s much-loved but now-closed Al’s Bar, and working in the set decorating departments of the film industry, were left behind to raise her kids in Virginia with her artist husband, Curtis Gutierrez. But eventually those kids grew up, and she has moved back to Los Angeles, this time with both an artist husband and an artist daughter, Isabel Gutierrez. She brought her degrees in graphic design and interior design together to establish her company, True Design, to develop products and provide design services reflecting her eye for color and balance, obsession with textiles, understanding of design history and appreciation of fine art. Her blog is called True Design Report.

WHAT PEOPLE ARE SAYING ABOUT THE BOOK AND THE PHOTOGRAPHY

Melissa Richardson Banks is our secret eyes, finding the secret light that illuminates the secrets of an ever-changing neighborhood and bringing them out into plain sight so that they are secrets no more.~ Cheech Marin, collector, art advocate and entertainer

Melissa Richardson Banks offers a poignant long-form photo-essay chronicling the changing contours of a singular place and time. Her taste for saturated color is met by the neighborhood’s organic proliferation of street art and industrial palimpsests. Her instinct for painterly detail appreciates the way rail tracks or light posts recede just so, the way the sun paints the sky and myriad reflections paint each other, and the peculiar architectural romance of the moribund manufacturing sector. In the tradition of classic street-photographers like Atget and Cartier-Bresson, her images capture a specific sense of place that looks like poetry, but does the job of documentary. Her unerring eye for the rhythms of her environment approaches the power of, if not nature exactly, then the thing that people like us chooses instead of nature.~ Shana Nys Dambrot – art critic, Whitehot Magazine

Great artists have flocked to Tumblr to share their work for the digital world to see. Unfortunately, those creative minds usually forget about Tumblr within a few weeks after creating it. That’s why Melissa Richardson Banks’ online anthology of downtown Los Angeles’ Art District, Downtown Muse, is such a treat. Richardson Banks shares her fly-on-the-wall view of street scenes and local stories a couple times a day. Every day. And if you want to get the offline experience of her Tumblr, she offers free neighborhood tours.~ Judge, 2013 LA Weekly Web Awards

Ace Hotel Downtown Los Angeles opens early 2014 in the historic United Artists building in Downtown LA. Built in 1927 for the maverick film studio, this ornate, storied and vibrant Los Angeles gem stands as a monument to a group of seminal American artists pushing out on their own, and anchors the Broadway Theater District’s modern renaissance. Mary Pickford’s love for the ornate detail and stone spires of Spanish castles and cathedrals is manifest at the theater — a true temple of the arts. (Ace Website http://www.acehotel.com/losangeles)

The mixture of reverent awe and irreverent independence is right up Ace’s alley — this is the kind of project that all of us in DTLA have been waiting for. This is a game changer.

Already by the look of the website that Ace has presented for Downtown LA they are getting to know the neighbors, they are exploring the cultures unique to Los Angeles and they are making efforts to make a contribution.

The corner of 9th and Broadway is already seeing the changes with retailers Aesop, A.P.C, Acne Studio, Tanner Goods, Oak NYC, Kinfolk, etc all grabbing up spaces around the new Ace Hotel. I love that they are on the right track, they are creating culture and not just using it for profit.

643 North is Downtown’s latest gastropub with an Italian twist. Like similar establishments, the focus is on featuring great drinks paired with sophisticated small and larger bites. In this case, the food is comforting (and reasonably priced!) while keeping somewhat of an edge to satisfy most L.A. diners. The challenge is its location: its building is off the beaten path in Chinatown on North Spring Street near Cesar Chavez Avenue.

Let’s get down to the important stuff … the well-stocked and carefully crafted drink menu! Many of the cocktails were designed by bartender Adam Acuff (Far Bar) and the full bar has 12 beers on tap, a menu for patrons to craft their own martinis and Manhattans, specialty cocktails, artisanal wine, aperitifs, digestifs, and alcoholic coffee drinks made with beans from Little Tokyo’s Demitasse Roasters.

Luckily, Melissa Richardson Banks of Downtown Muse joined me for my first visit to 643 North, which allowed us to sample a greater variety of drinks. We started off by sipping from the restaurant’s signature menu. Our first drink was the “Red Hot Cherry Pepper,” which is a spicy mix of Del Maguey Mezcal Vida, Cocchi Vermouth di Torino, and Cherry Heering liqueur accented with a sliced red bell pepper and chopped jalapeno pepper. It had a nice kick in the mouth with a balanced spicy, yet gentle flavor.

Our next drink was “Smokey the Pear,” a light mix of High West Whiskey Campfire®, St. Germain elderflower liqueur, spiced pear syrup, lemon juice, and Fee’s Whiskey Barrel-Aged Bitters. This refreshing cocktail is just right and is not overpowered with sweetness.

“Go Figure Yourself” – perhaps 643 North’s most complex and best signature cocktail – offers a perfect mix of Avion Reposado tequila, Bénédictine liqueur, Carpano Antica sweet vermouth, fig thyme syrup, lime juice and fig bitters topped with a splash of Pinot Noir. The drink evolves the longer it sits – the first sip gives you a nice wine flavor followed by a nice second layer of reposado with a fig finish. After 10 minutes, the flavors mature (wine breathing!) and the flavor solidifies into a complex rich flavor that pleases the palate and does not overpower … potent, rich and downright delicious.

Regarding beer, 643 North has done a great job in selecting seasonal craft beers. From the current menu, I love the Smoked Porter from Stone Brewing Co. and the Great Divide’s Yeti Imperial Stout by Great Divide Brewing Company. There are also selections from Black Market Brewing and Ninkasi Brewing. You can get a flight of four for a reasonable $12.

Last, but not least, 643 North offers a hefty selection of aperitifs and digestifs. After tasting several small bites and sampling pizza, we opted to share a flight of digestifs (four for $16). I recommend the Fernet Jelinek (Czech) if you like strong, explosive flavors and the Rhubarbo Zucca Amaro if you prefer velvety smooth complex flavors. Either one will pacify you into a well-earned food coma destined to come.

Be sure to ask bartender Adam Acuff for suggestions as he is well versed in his craft and can help guide you in your adventure. Cheers to the newest – and most welcomed – addition to the DTLA culinary family!

This weekend at LA Mart, Artisanal L.A. brings together community shopping, tasting, programming and learning experiences, showcasing Los Angeles’ finest local, sustainable, handmade edibles and home goods. Along with a pop-up urban garden, lectures, workshops ranging from pickling, cocktails, and baking to butchering with Lindy and Grundy and the intricacies of the Home Food Act, there’s a pop-up book shop where Nancy Silverton of Mozza and other food-focused authors will be signing their books. And of course there’s art (curated by EVFA), gift items, and a cafe showcasing local foods and beverages. The exciting two-day shopping event makes it easy for you to buy local, support LA’s economy (100% of vendors’ products are made right here in Southern California with local and sustainable goods), discover new favorites, get a jump on holiday shopping, and join in community while having a ball.

Join Natasha and Cheech Marin on Saturday, October 5, 2013 for a special evening of art and music under the stars. The couple is bringing their exclusive Marin Salon Seriesoutside of their home to support Plaza de la Raza, which has provided performing and visual arts programs and services to youth and families in East Los Angeles since 1970.

Each VIP Admission admits one during 4:00 PM to 6:00 PM plus one Chicanitas art book ($40 value) signed by Cheech Marin plus an exclusive Marin Salon Series performance by classical pianist Natasha Marin with cellist Maksim Velichkin followed by an art talk by Cheech Marin.

In the next 3 weeks Plaza de La Raza features two new events, one for the whole family and one for the sophisticated art & music lover. Please join us for both and thank you for your support. Plaza de La Raza is a 501-c3 Non-Profit.

Feria de La Familia

Sunday Sept. 22nd

Bring the entire family to enjoy and celebrate the sounds, sights, and traditions of Latino art and culture at Plaza de la Raza Cultural Center for the Arts & Education in East Los Angeles. Highlights of the Target Feria de la Familia include: music and dance performances on Target Stage in Lincoln Park; art activities for youth in Plaza’s courtyard and patio; storytelling, puppets, and songs in the Margo Albert Theatre; and performances on the Willie Velasquez Outdoor Stage

Noche de Arte y Musica
Saturday Oct. 5th

Join Cheech and Natasha Marin for this very special evening of art and music under the stars. The couple is bringing their exclusive Marin Salon Series outside of their home to support Plaza de la Raza, which has provided performing and visual arts programs and services to youth and families in East Los Angeles since 1970.

During their special VIP Pre-Event from 4:00 PM to 6:00 PM only, classical pianist Natasha Marin will perform with cellist Maksim Velichkin followed by an art talk by Cheech Marin. Attendees will join afterwards for the Public Event that starts at 6:00 PM and ends at 12 midnight.

$10 GENERAL ADMISSION admits ONE GUEST ONLY from 6:00 PM until 12 Midnight. Food, drinks, art and other items for sale are not included in the cost for General Admission. NOTE: This is a 21+ event only. Proper ID required.

$100 VIP ADMISSION admits ONE GUEST ONLY DURING 4:00 PM to 6:00 PM (limited to 200 attendees) for an exclusive Marin Salon Series performance by classical pianist Natasha Marin with cellist Maksim Velichkin and an art talk by Cheech in the Margo Albert Theatre plus one Chicanitas book SIGNED by Cheech ($50 value) plus access to a VIP-only exhibit walkthrough with Cheech in the Boathouse Gallery. VIP ADMISSION tickets must be purchased in advance. VIP INQUIRIES ONLY:(213) 537-4483 or art@causeconnect.net

Premiering during the 2013 Target Feria de la Familia is the annual exhibition of Con Nuestras Manos | With Our Hands, which features artwork by Plaza students. On view in the Margo Albert Theater Lobby, the exhibition will be open to the public free of charge through Friday, December 6 during regular operating hours of Monday-Friday 10:00 AM to 8:00 PM and Saturday 10:00 AM to 2:00 PM.

Opodz opened on June 3rd, 2013 at its Little Tokyo location on 362 E. 2nd Street in Los Angeles, CA. The grand opening is Friday, June 21st featuring a panel of socially conscious business owners and organizational reps talking about “doing business by doing good”.

The Grand Opening is scheduled for Friday, June 21, 2013 and is by Invitation only from 6-9pm. The night will feature speakers; Internet Superstar George Takei, Melissa Richardson Banks of CauseConnect, Drew Tewksbury of KCET’s Artbound, Shauna Nep of Goldhirsh Foundation / LA2050. These innovators will share a little about their respective company’s vision.

The night will begin and end with a cocktail mixer and tours of the new OPODZ facility. The night is organized by Edgar Varela of EVFA, a cultural production company in DTLA. There will be a small art exhibition featuring work by local artist Rachael Rendon.

With a career spanning five decades, George Takei is known around the world for his founding role in the acclaimed television series Star Trek, in which he played Hikaru Sulu, helmsman of the Starship Enterprise. Takei starred in three seasons of Star Trek and later reprised his iconic role in six movies.
Mashable.com says Takei is the #1 most-influential person on Facebook, with more than 4 million friends. Takei has nearly 650,000 followers on Twitter. Takei authored “Oh Myyy! There Goes the Internet,” released in e-book and paperback earlier this year, and it ranked #10 on the New York Times E-book nonfiction list.
Takei currently lives in Los Angeles with his husband Brad Takei. They were married at the Japanese American National Museum in Little Tokyo on Sept. 14, 2008.

Melissa Richardson Banks (CauseConnect)

As President and Founder of the consulting firm CauseConnect, Melissa Richardson Banks specializes in helping companies reach their target markets and fulfill corporate social responsibility goals through signature community programs designed to engage employees, meaningfully connect with charities and causes, and uniquely incorporate the arts and the environment. In addition to major corporations such as Toyota Financial Services and Target, she advises small businesses on best practices when partnering with nonprofits. As an independent cultural producer, she manages Cheech Marin’s noted Chicano art collection and produces cultural events such as museum exhibitions, festivals, speaker events, concerts, and salons designed to engage audiences and foster community. An author, book editor, and art publisher, Richardson Banks is also a photographer who documents her changing Arts District neighborhood in Los Angeles through her Downtown Muse blog.

Drew Tewksbury (KCET Artbound)

Drew Tewksbury is Managing Editor and Producer of KCET public media’s cultural journalism project Artbound. He has come from a diverse media background, having worked as a producer for NPR, a regular music columnist for L.A. Weekly, and Senior Writer/ Contributing Editor for Flaunt Magazine. He curates Los Angeles Magazine’s Guide section and has produced bi-weekly, on-air music review pieces for KPCC’s Madeleine Brand Show. As a freelance arts and culture journalist/critic, he has written and produced pieces for NPR’s ‘All Things Considered,’ Los Angeles Times, Nylon Guys, BoxOffice Magazine, NME, Art News, Hollywood Reporter, Back Stage Magazine, Swindle Magazine, Style in Progress (Austria), People Magazine, and more.

Shauna Nep (Goldhirsh Foundation / LA2050)

Shauna Nep is a social innovation manager at the Goldhirsh Foundation. She has a background in program development, and in mobilizing online and offline engagement with various organizations in Los Angeles. She previously worked in programming at the Urban and Environmental Policy Institute at Occidental College and as program director of the Woolly School Garden Program. She has a master’s degree in bioethics from New York University.

Opodz is a new creative coworking space located at 362 E. 2nd Street in Los Angeles, CA 90012. Opodz provides comfortable shared desk space and high speed WiFi Internet access in a well-designed, creative office environment. Opodz also features an event space, conference room, kitchen, and above all, a friendly, collaborative, professional atmosphere among members. Opodz offers various levels of month-to-month membership, and a daily drop-in rate is also available. It is also available for events, seminars, and meet-ups.

Coworking provides the opportunity for small business owners, independent contractors, virtual employees, and other freelancers to build a collaborative community of professionals that inspires creativity, serendipity, and exploration. Coworking attracts a wide spectrum of users, including web developers, programmers, graphic designers, writers, editors, technology professionals, artists, Internet marketers, and other such creative professionals who often find themselves in coffee shops or libraries in an effort to increase their productivity and stimulate social interaction.

Opodz chose Downtown LA as its location because of its bustling street life and unique creative vibe, as well as its proximity to the neighboring creative neighborhoods The area is lined with many new, up-and-coming businesses, including restaurants, shops, galleries, artist studios, cafes, pubs, and salons, providing a cool and contemporary backdrop for professionals who choose to spend time working and interacting at Opodz.

To learn more about Opodz or to be invited to the inaugural event on June 21st please call John at 949.212.3561 or email info@opodz.com. For complete information, visit www.Opodz.com. Join the Opodz community and socialize online at www.Facebook.com/Opodz and Twitter atwww.Twitter.com/Opodz. Edgar Varela can be reached at Edgar@EdgarVarela.com

Paris Photo was created in 1996 and is the most prestigious art fair dedicated to historical and contemporary photography. This fair takes place annually at the Grand Palais in Paris mid-November and at theParamount Pictures Studios in Los Angeles at the end of April.

Over the past 16 years, Paris Photo has become a significant event for collectors of contemporary and modern art, photography professionals, artists, as well as for an ever-growing audience of art appreciators. Each edition is unique and brings together a distinguished selection of exhibitors with diverse collections focused on the photographic medium. A public program is also an important component of the fairs which is built around cultural events involving artists, art world professionals, collectors, and cultural institutions.

Enriched by the unique cultural environment of these two cities, Paris Photo offers its visitors an unsurpassed experience in two historic locations which bring together all the different trends in photography.

Matt Maust has been making mixed media art since around 2000. he combines illustration, photo and type. he has been in a few group shows and even fewer solo shows since the last 10 years. He has also been regularly playing bass in the band cold war kids since about 2004.

Cody Comrie is an multimedia artist based in LA. He graduated from The Art Institute of Seattle majoring in Industrial Design. He has been a part of numerous group shows and has had one solo show at the R&R gallery. His recent design work has been featured on record covers as well as posters and adverts. He is co-founding a clothing line called The End. His favorite band is Joy Division.

Harley Cortez is an artist/musician raised in Inglewood, CA & Queens, NYC. Currently based in Echo Park, he uses multimedia and classic materials to create portraits and images of the world he finds locally and in his travels (Japanese train workers, teachers, street vendors, homeless artists). He has been involved in numerous group shows in recent years. He has played music and toured (Red Cortez, Weather underground, Just Animal) for the last 8 years. His new musical moniker is called ‘halfbluud’.

Hello Fellow Downtowners, I am running for the At-Large Director seat on the Downtown Los Angeles Neighborhood Council (DLANC). Elections are being held on November 15th in DTLA. As a 10 year resident and a business owner in DTLA I feel that I know some of our needs and I want a chance to continue to make a difference. Spread the word, come out and Vote. It’s your neighborhood, participate, help mold its future!

I have served as Arts, Culture & Education Resident director for the past two years. This year I am running for the At-Large Director on the Neighborhood Council, which means you can all vote for me!

Election day is November 15th, so I will remind you as things get closer. I will also post my recommendations on candidates for the Arts, Culture and Education seats.

The Downtown Los Angeles Neighborhood Council (DLANC) will be holding its bi-annual elections on Thursday November 15th from 2-8 pm. I strongly suggest that all downtowners vote. Stakeholders in this election are not limited to local residents; anyone who does any kind of business in downtown or lives here is eligible to vote. That means that if you work here, own a business, are homeless and live on the streets of downtown, live in a SRO, a loft, or a hotel, you can vote. Stakeholdership is self-declared and no proof is required.

The polling location will be at The Exchange, at 114 West 5th St, between Spring and Main Streets. That is the community space on the ground floor of the Rosslyn Hotel, next door to my gallery.

Please come out and vote. DLANC is an advisory board which gives local citizens information and input into any and all public and community projects, as well as providing a small budget for the Board to initiate its own projects. The most useful aspect of DLANC’s activities is the role it plays in providing community voice to the decisions made at City Council. The two City Council members representing Downtown LA, Jan Perry and Jose Huizer, pay close attention to the advice they receive from DLANC. It is vital that our community participate and provide this advice to our elected leaders. It is possible for us to influence city policy this way; in fact DLANC has been the single most effective Neighborhood Council in the short history of the system, which was created at the beginning of the last decade.

“We Were In Sicily” (Revisited)

Photographs by Rachel Roze

EVFA is pleased to present a revisiting of Rachel Roze’s solo show, We Were In Sicily, a selection of work from Il Pesce Pazzo. Here are a couple statements about this collection of works.

+The collection of photographs taken in the summer of 2011 and shot entirely in film showcases her 40-day trip in Sicily, Italy. An enticing invitation to her Italian peregrination, her works offer stills flooded with sexuality, nationality, and the naked truth of seductive youth. Voluntarily, the viewer joins Roze in exploring the female body, men, and a culture of lust and the content. Playfully pushing the boundaries between personal and shared, Il Pesce Pazzo infiltrates the viewer into a sea of curiosity while the heat of the city, the men, and the markets, shower the voyeuristic onlooker. Layers of affection and admiration meet a hot and sticky meat-market, and with religion on every wall and the nude on every floor, Roze beautifully appropriates the rediscovery and documentation of the illicit. The onlooker can’t help but join Roze in her escapades into the grainy crevices of sex, and Sicily.
– Elena Parasco

+Photographer Rachel Roze’s “We Were in Sicily” is not subtle at first glance, but take a longer look, because you are going to want to, and you will find layers upon layers in a singular composition. The work was all done on film, not Instagram, and has a quality that feels vintage, although it was made during a 40-day trip to Sicily, Italy, in the summer of 2011. The work has sexually charged overtones, while the muted tones give an old-world romance quality. However, I urge you to not only focus on the obvious ones. Roze views the city and her perspective offers a sense of familiarity and complete immersion that is unlike anything a tourist could accomplish.
– Kathy M.Y. Pyon, LA Times

About Rachel Roze:
“I have a lot of chameleon qualities, I get very absorbed in my surroundings”
River Phoenix

I grew up in an untraditional family in a traditional suburb outside of New York City; a place where artists were not appreciated and the norm was. Craving change, I packed my bags at nineteen and decided to move myself to California; I wanted to live “over the rainbow,” something about California was calling me. I arrived in California for the first time and quickly realized I had accidentally rented a room in a trailer park, not in an apartment, in a strange area known as Ojai. Living in that trailer park for almost a year, before later moving to LA, flipped my whole world around. I needed to capture everything, the vividness, the chaos; I needed to capture my surroundings. This is where I picked up photography. It was my way of holding on to the newness of this strange place, like keeping a visual journal. I spent the following years in LA developing my hobby into a profession, working with a handful of well-known photographers and artists, who helped guide my craft, and along the way graduated from Brooks Institute Of Photography with a Bachelors degree in Visual Communication. My work is a look into my life, capturing moments, people, and myself on a daily basis; I capture my surroundings.

Edgar Varela Fine Arts is dedicated to exhibiting compelling work from exciting emerging and mid-career artists as well as providing a platform for interaction and conversation about the contemporary art world. EVFA also curates and produces relevant cultural happenings that impact the perception on traditional art roles in society. The gallery space is open from Wednesday to Saturday from 12pm to 6pm and by appointment. For more information call Edgar Varela at 213-604-3634, e-mail at edgar@edgarvarela.com or visit www.EdgarVarela.com.

EVFA is proud to be the Visual Art Presenter for SWAN LAKE

Following a sold-out debut season, Silverlake Contemporary Ballet presents Swan Lake, featuring live music by three acclaimed indie rock bands. In our present-day adaptation of the full-length ballet, we tell a classic story through contemporary movement and large-scale paintings, created by artists throughout the progression of the show. Silverlake Contemporary Ballet has set the three-act piece in present day Los Angeles to tell the story of a love that is tested by Hollywood morality.

Many moons ago as a teenager I began producing small music events in the city of Los Angeles. These events involved navigating a nightlife scene in Los Angeles that now looking back on was a little dangerous for a 15-year old. Warehouses, lots, clubs, pop-up art shows is where it all happened, where my love of artistic creators began to flourish.

This continued for years until the day I decided that I might take a more serious stance in my life. I studied Business and Marketing, started working, built a career and 10 years after I started creating events I found myself deeply entrenched in the world of commercial banking and real estate, my role was as the commercial real estate analyst and appraiser for major developers and banks. I was drawing a good salary and at the time, was happy with my direction in life. However slowly but surely my urge for more creativity began to emerge and was no longer satisfied with the occasional museum visit, concert or party. With my brother Rush going to Art Center College of Design, I felt the urge creeping back even more. As a side project I began to put together small networking events in order for my brother and his friends to have a great meeting spot and network with my other friends in the film, fashion, music and art fields.

This was the spark. At this point what was a hobby took a life of its own. Leaving the safety of the corporate world I started my EVFA art gallery out of my loft and began presenting monthly art shows, music shows, producing small films and facilitating in all aspects of fashion, it was a fantastic rush of creativity. Now, I wont give away all my secrets that have led to a successful transition from the corporate banking world to the world of Art and production, but I will say this; I started EVFA as a labor of love with a make or break attitude as far as financial success, I love what I do as I get to choose all the amazing people I work with and I am surrounded in amazing visual and audio art, so my passion for it is on everything you see my logo on. EVFA will always strive to provide you with a little extra no matter what we do.

Look for the Gallery Openings which mostly feature outstanding emerging artists from U.S., Music happenings which feature Breakout music talent from California with special touring guests, Film community networking events and small art film production (I will start posting some here) and larger scale community festivals. It is all about being creative, expressing your passion, to me all these industries are all the same, we all want to make a living doing what we love, I try to make a living helping people do what they love, pushing them to the front of the stage and showing off there talents like a proud parent, regardless of financial success. I believe art and culture to be a necessity of life and I am here to help you get your share of it.

Edgar Varela produces public and private cultural events throughout Los Angeles; he is based out of his Downtown Los Angeles art gallery where he maintains regular art openings. On his spare time he sits on the board of two arts non-profits and is the board director on the Neighborhood Council. You can find him working production, music and art at Bloomfest LA, Abbot Kinney Fest, Target Fiesta de la Familia and at his gallery @ 727 S. Spring Street, LA 90014.

There’s something profoundly unsettled about Flashback to Now, a series of oil on canvas paintings by Los Angeles based Eloy Torrez and photographs by Juliane Backmann.

In Torrez’s “She Said He Said” A hollow-faced couple stares out of the canvas from a rumpled bed. A businessman levitates front and center above a desert floor while other working professionals recede with backs turned. A white-faced autobiographical character jumps into the foreground as an office building and a pair of car stereo speakers take to the air in “Somewhere between Los Angeles and Albuquerque”. What is the relationship between these subjects? Who are they now? Who were they before?

Juliane Backmann’s photographs of urban landscapes likewise asks more questions than it answers. Using a large format field camera with color negative film, Los Angeles based Backmann captures banks, lobbies, churches, courtyards, parking lots and other silent protagonists of the urban landscape, each one devoid of people. Her empty vignettes speak as much to what’s in the frame as what’s not. Where has everyone gone? What is the purpose of these spaces when empty?

In the case of both Torrez and Backmann, the work isn’t about what unfolds in front of the viewer. It’s about the cracks in between. It is work that tells of the passing of time–not of people and not of places. Generations unfold in Torrez’s surreal scenes–that which brings his subjects together is seemingly less powerful than the stories that divide them. In Backmann’s photographs, time of day is obscured and purpose of space is obscured too. Hers are still lives of a place caught off-guard and off-duty. Combined, the works of these two artists is a convergence of oblique narratives and stories partially told.

As one of Los Angeles’ most iconic muralists over the past three decades, Eloy Torrez has long been to uncovering such stories. Among his works are the Pope of Broadway mural on the Victor Clothing Company building in downtown Los Angeles, and Portrait of Hollywood, a John Ritter tribute mural at Hollywood High School. He is a 2009 C.O.L.A. grant recipient. A native of New Mexico, Torrez is a graduate of Otis Art Institute.

Juliane Backmann too has had turned her lens on the people and places of her adopted city. Originally from Muenster, Germany, Backmann has chronicled the Los Angeles art scene over the last fifteen years for a forthcoming book of portraits, featuring artists Carlee Fernandez, Eugenia Butler and more. She has exhibited internationally and is the recipient of a 2013 Emily Harvey Foundation artist residency in Venice, Italy. Backmann studied photography at the Academy of Photography in Munich.

Totaling five works by Torrez and six by Backmann, these two series will be exhibited as one, intermixed on the walls at Edgar Varela Fine Art (EVFA) in downtown Los Angeles. The exhibition is on view from June 23 – July 21, 2012.

LOS ANGELES – Pianists Natasha Marin and Gerald Robbins announce an exciting collaboration, which launches this summer with a concert at UCLA Schoenberg Hall on June 16 followed by a performance this fall at Carnegie Weill Recital Hall in New York.

The West Coast premiere showcases works by 19th-century quintessential romantic composers. The hour-long program opens with Anton Arensky (Silhouetten, Suite op. 23) and Johannes Brahms (Variations on a theme by Haydn, op. 56b). After intermission, the performance continues with Sergei Rachmaninoff (Suite No2 op. 17) and Camille Saint-Saëns (Variations on a theme by Beethoven op. 35).

The East Coast premiere is at Carnegie Weill Recital Hall in New York on Thursday, November 8. Program and ticket information will be released later this summer. Both concerts are produced by CauseConnect and EVFA. To receive notifications on this and other performances by Natasha Marin, sign up online to join her mailing list atwww.natashamarin.com.

Gerald Robbins has distinguished himself internationally as a soloist, recitalist, and chamber musician of poetic sensitivity and virtuosic technique. Since capturing a major prize at the Van Cliburn International Piano Competition in 1969, he has performed regularly in the world’s major music centers throughout Europe, Japan, and the United States. As a soloist accompanied by an orchestra, he has performed with the Los Angeles Philharmonic, Royal Philharmonic, BBC Symphony and its affiliates, and Royal Liverpool Symphony under such conductors as Zubin Mehta, Neville Marriner, Edouard van Remoortel, Okku Kamu, Jorge Mester, and Lawrence Foster. In addition, Robbins’ chamber music activities include collaborations with noted violinists Nathan Milstein, Pinchas Zukerman, Kyung-Wha Chung, Glenn Dicterow, and Ruggiero Ricci. Featured on numerous radio and television broadcasts, Robbins performed Rhapsody in Blue on the Emmy-award winning Gershwin TV special starring Steve Lawrence and Eydie Gorme, and was the featured pianist on the soundtrack for the Academy Award-winning British film, A Shocking Accident. A champion of neglected romantic repertoire, Robbins’ artistry on the London-Decca, Orion and Genesis labels include world-premiere recordings of concerti by Litolff and Reinecke. He is co-founder of the Lyric Piano Quartet and is a member of the chamber music faculty of the Manhattan School of Music in New York City.

“Natasha Marin was impressive … Under her hands, she nearly pinned the audience to their seats with a fiery rendition of Chopin’s scherzo” ~ Boulevard Sentinel

Russian-born Natasha Marin began studying piano at age 6 and was later accepted into the Special Music School for Gifted Children at the St. Petersburg State Conservatory. She earned her B.A. in piano performance from the conservatory’s Rimsky-Korsakov Music College, graduating with honors, and later studied with Leonid Sintsev and Igor Lebedev. After moving to California, she attended UCLA where she studied piano with Vitaly Margulis and Professor Antoinette Perry, contemporary music with Grammy Award-winning pianist Gloria Cheng, and worked with acclaimed scholar/media author Robert Winter.

Currently, she performs classical genres (and non-classical repertoire) as a soloist and with piano duos, vocalists, and chamber ensembles. In addition to radio and television appearances, she has recorded and performed live at St. Petersburg Philharmonic Hall in Russia, Comerica Theater in Phoenix, Gable Theater Stage in Coral Gables, Florida, Leo Bing Theater, Colburn School’s Zipper Hall, and Thorne Hall in Los Angeles, and other U.S. and international venues.

Premiering June 2008 in Los Angeles, her piano duo “Double Sharp” with Maria Demina won the Grand Prize at a regional competition and appeared live and on the radio nationwide. The program features music of Russian romantic and 20th-century composers, incorporating an innovative presentation with custom costumes by designer Vera DeFehr. “Double Sharp” has performed also at charity events like Robert Shapiro’s Foundation and Alice Cooper’s Solid Rock Foundation.

Together with French soprano Nicol Mecerova, Marin created “Voyage a Paris,” program spanning 200 years of the French Art Song, which was presented in the US and Russia. She also performs with her husband actor/comedian Cheech Marin. The couple has appeared at the Hollywood Bowl, Valley Performing Arts Center of the California State University, Northridge, and Bonnaroo Festival in Manchester, Tennessee. She has also worked with Grammy Award-winning producer Peter Asher, playing piano on “Street Spirit (Fade Out)” for the album “Siren” by vocal duo Sasha and Shawna (Manhattan Records, 2007).

I like creating something that doesn’t really exist – a physical representation of a fantasy or dream. I begin an image usually with a vision or a sketch from a dream. From there I pull together my team, cast a model and build the environment in which the image is to take place. I often invent lighting schemes and camera techniques to support the realization of my images. These settings do not exist and so I cannot use traditional means to document them. I must go outside the normal boundaries of how a camera is used and instead use it’s unique characteristics to distort and blur reality in order to create my images.

I do my work because it is the only way I can communicate these beautiful visions. They are my representations of the beauty which I see in the world. When I create, I am reminded that the vision inside of me is larger than the sum of the individual parts that are invested in its creation. I view being able to create these images as a remarkable gift and the amount of trust and cooperation that it takes to create my images is reflected in the intimacy present within them.

Currently, I’m trying to refine the language I use to communicate my dreams. I want to increase the impact and potency of my images. I am exploring how far I can bring the camera into my dreams and how well I can document things that don’t exist and have never happened. I am exploring people’s reactions to these things and using their perceptions of the camera as an archival truth-teller to confuse and disorient the viewer into believing that these ephemeral apparitions exist in the material realm. When people see my work I would like them to use it to reflect upon their own attitudes about beauty and to see that these visions are an intimate part of me, which I am sharing with the world.

Opens Friday April 20th 2012, 6pm -9 pm with a reception for the artists. It is open to the public.

Sponsored by PAMA Liqueurs an Frey Organic Wines.

The exhibition will be open from April 20th, through June 1st at The Analog Salon at Samitaur Constructs, 3535 Hayden Avenue, Culver City, California. Gallery hours are 9am through 5pm, Monday through Friday.

Participating artists:

Viggo Mortenson

Gary Baseman

Lawren Alice

Sam Comen

Marjan Vayghan

Jody Zellen

Mark Schumacher & Scott Elgart

Sara Jane Boyers

Emily Bradley

Johnny White

Jennifer Vanderpool

Suzanne Adelman

“Looking Glass”

Everyone knows a painter, for example, starts with a blank canvas and piles of pigment and that whether they makes landscape, portrait, or abstract images based in whole, in part, or not at all on external phenomenon, that the thing they make is wholly created from “nothing” or, put another way “imagination” whereas photography by definition involves interacting with the external world not entirely of your making. For LOOKING GLASS I’ve assembled a dozen photographers whose work is in various ways made in a collaboration between the imagination and the world — to explore ways that the camera is an expressive, fantastical, imaginative and pliable medium as well as form of document that contains evidence of external reality.

The Analog Salon is a fine art photographic exhibition space housed at Samitaur Constructs, the noted architectural firm, in partnership with Digital Fusion, a premiere digital photographic rental and post-production facility and produced by Edgar Varela (EVFA). Located in Culver City, California, The Analog Salon highlights the exceptional talent of new, emerging and established photographers with an emphasis on Los Angeles based artists. Supporting the arts by providing not only a space but a full production and marketing effort to showcase talent and support artist projects, The Analog Salon will contribute to the art dialogue integrating its associated artists and partners as an important part of the cultural life of Los Angeles.

Ansel Adams Los Angeles

Edgar Varela Fine Arts (EVFA) in association with drkrm are honored to present Ansel Adams Los Angeles, rarely seen photographs that reveal the lost landscape and lifestyle of a prewar Los Angeles. These nostalgic images from the archives of The Los Angeles Public Library Ansel Adams Collection, represent Ansel Adams as a photojournalist on assignment for Fortune Magazine in 1940. Ansel Adams Los Angeles will be on display from February 18 through March 17, 2012.

In 1940 Los Angeles had a population of 1.5 million. The cost of gas was 10 cents and a new car was $700. The U.S. began rearming for World War II and the prestigious Ansel Adams was commissioned by Fortune Magazine to photograph a series of images for an article covering the aviation industry in the Los Angeles area. For the project, Adams took over 200 black & white photographs showing everyday life, businesses, street scenes and a variety of other subjects. But when the article, City of the Angels, appeared in the March 1941 issue, only a few of the images were included.

In the early 1960s Adams rediscovered the photographs among papers at his home in Carmel and donated them to the Los Angeles Public Library. He wrote in a letter: “The weather was bad over a rather long period and none of the pictures were very good… I would imagine that they represent about $100.00 minimum value… At any event, I do not want them back.” But as many critics will agree, sometimes an artist is not always the best judge of their own work.

Ansel Adams (1902-1984) created some of the most influential photographs ever made; he was one of this century’s leading exponents of environmental values. It seems that every third family in America has an Adams’ poster on the wall, images that were difficult to make but easy to love. His images portray a romanticized and unspoiled Western American landscape, but Ansel Adams Los Angeles is a whole other body of work that is rarely discussed, let alone seen.

drkrm, in association with Edgar Varela Fine Arts (EVFA), and with the cooperation of the The Los Angeles Public Library Photo Collection and The Ansel Adams Publishing Rights Trust, will create and exhibit new silver-gelatin prints made from the original negatives. These dramatic black and white limited-edition photographs, on display to the public for the first time, will be offered for purchase with a portion of the proceeds benefiting the LAPL.

Ansel Adams Los Angeles is part of Pacific Standard Time. Pacific Standard Time is an unprecedented collaboration of more than sixty cultural institutions across Southern California, coming together to tell the story of the birth of the L.A. art scene. Initiated through grants from the Getty Foundation, Pacific Standard Time will take place for six months beginning October 2011.

Pacific Standard Time is an initiative of the Getty. The presenting sponsor is Bank of America.
All gallery events are free and open to the public.

Ansel Adams Los Angeles

In 1939, Ansel Adams was commissioned by Fortune Magazine to photograph a series of images for an article covering the aviation history of the Los Angeles area. For the project, Adams took over 200 black & white photographs showing everyday life, businesses, street scenes and a variety of other subjects, but when the article, City of the Angels, appeared in the March 1941 issue, only a few of the images were included.

In the early 1960s Adams rediscovered the photographs among papers at his home in Carmel and donated the photographs to the Los Angeles Public Library. He wrote in a letter: “The weather was bad over a rather long period and none of the pictures were very good… I would imagine that they represent about $100.00 minimum value… At any event, I do not want them back.”

drkrm, in association with EVFA (Edgar Varela Fine Arts), with the cooperation of the Los Angeles Public Library, present these rarely seen and some never before exhibited photographs that reveal the lost landscape and lifestyle of a prewar Los Angeles.

Born in Springfield, Massachusetts, based in Los Angeles, CA, Stephanie Vovas is a winner of a bronze PX3 2011, and a PDN Faces Contest Winner, 2011. She has been in numerous group shows in the past few years, including MOPLA/Smashbox, and is also in private collections.

She graduated from the University of Maine/Maine Photographic Workshops, in 1993. It is there she discovered her photo idols: Helmut Newton, Larry Sultan, Gary Winogrand, Stephen Shore, and learned to express herself through her photography. She was heavily drawn to experimenting with photo processes, rather than formal studio work. She has an extensive body of Polaroid work in addition to her recent digital work.

Stephanie makes photographs of people that tell stories, and show a side of the person no one has ever seen, be it real or made-up. Private moments, transformation, beauty, sensuality, and uncertainty are what she is interested in photographically. She lives in Los Angeles with her boyfriend Tom.

Assyrian Aid Society

Mesopotamia Art and Artists in Diaspora

Paul Batou
Qais Al Sindy
Odette Tomik
John Hajjar
Ramsin Yefima

The Art show will feature Mesopotamian artists from Iraq, Iran, Syria, and Turkey.

Mesopotamians are the remaining Christian minorities (also known as the Assyrian, Chaldean and Syriac) in the region. Through out the history, they were forced to leave their land and migrate to various regions around the world, due to horrors of Ethnic-cleansing massacres and wars, in search of democracy and freedom.

Mesopotamian artists representing their passion for freedom, peace, beauty of nature and different aspects from the region through a variety of cultural subjects and mediums, believe that the whole world is a mixture of colors that forms a harmony with love and peace which should be preserved for all humanity.

The event is sponsored by Assyrian Aid Society of America which is a 501(c)(3) non-profit organization, dedicated to helping people with their basic needs such as food, shelter, healthcare in the Ninveh region. This event is to promote Mesopotamian Art, culture and values. All proceeds are dedicated for building schools, promoting education

Tasya van Ree has always been intrigued by the everyday wonders of the visual world. The sense of expansive awareness that for van Ree is a prerequisite to photography enables her to capture the small everyday flashes of insight that come when we are open to them and often go before we can fully grasp or appreciate them. Her extraordinarily vivid images are also a testimony to her eye for form and composition. Her photographs are infused with romanticism, darkness, intimacy, and a certain lyrical quality. They also capture the essence of the people, the landscape, and the intricacies of both the animate and inanimate worlds, and are a sort of meditation in seeing the powerful testaments between the relationship of human presence and transitory nature.

Van Ree’s works are both formally vigorous and eternally evocative. Van Ree has consistently produced a highly compelling body of work on varied subjects. Her photographs have been exhibited widely (in solo exhibitions as well as along side David Lynch, Jessica Lange, Gus van Sant, and Amy Arbus), and are included in numerous private collections.

The idea of Hollywood has intrigued and inspired image-makers for the last century and it’s no different today. Photographers find themselves continually fascinated by not only the notion of Hollywood, but by the city and community of Hollywood. For some, it’s the feeling of noir and night, for others, it’s the reality of the streets and neighborhoods. Photographers are influenced by movie stars and the idea of celebrity, and by the movies themselves. There is a rich tapestry of photographic ideas and inspiration that emerge from the tangible and intangible idea of Hollywood, and with each unique photographic vision, these photographers are Redefining Hollywood.

About the Analog Salon

The Analog Salon is a project space donated by Samitaur. In a partnership with Digital Fusion, Analog Salon highlights exceptional talent in the world of fine art photography. By partnering with industry leaders, DF is helping showcase artists in a salon setting in Culver City by celebrating new, emerging and established photographers with an emphasis on Los Angeles based artists.

The new space represents a modern movement in supporting the arts by providing not only a space but a full production and marketing project to showcase talent and support artist efforts. The space will provide sponsored printing and framing, sponsored events based on the work and will include lectured, discussion panels and artist talks. All events will have a reception event and will be backed by local arts and entertainment media.

Along with Samitaur Constructs and under the guidance of architect Eric Owen Moss, Digital Fusion has provided a space to display and celebrate photography. Regular curated gallery exhibits will occur at the Culver City canvas setting. A dynamic partnership has been established with Contemporary Cultural led by cultural curator Edgar Varela as well as partnerships with local art world staples; Artweek LA, LA Canvas, Flavorpill LA, KCRW & Dublab..

The Analog Gallery will ad to the important dialogue taking place in the art world and will integrate the associated entities as an important part of the life of Los Angeles culture.

The idea of Hollywood has intrigued and inspired image-makers for the last century and it’s no different today. Photographers find themselves continually fascinated by not only the notion of Hollywood, but by the city and community of Hollywood. For some, it’s the feeling of noir and night, for others, it’s the reality of the streets and neighborhoods. Photographers are influenced by movie stars and the idea of celebrity, and by the movies themselves. There is a rich tapestry of photographic ideas and inspiration that emerge from the tangible and intangible idea of Hollywood, and with each unique photographic vision, these photographers are Redefining Hollywood.

About the Analog Salon

The Analog Salon is a project by Digital Fusion that highlights exceptional talent in the world of fine art photography. By partnering with industry leaders, DF is showcasing artists in its salon setting in Culver City by celebrating new, emerging and established photographers with an emphasis on Los Angeles based artists.

The new space represents a modern movement in supporting the arts by providing not only a space but a full production and marketing project to showcase talent and support artist efforts. The space will provide sponsored printing and framing, sponsored events based on the work and will include lectured, discussion panels and artist talks. All events will have a reception event and will be backed by local arts and entertainment media.

Along with Samitaur Constructs and under the guidance of architect Eric Owen Moss, Digital Fusion has provided a space to display and celebrate photography. Regular curated gallery exhibits will occur at the Culver City canvas setting. A dynamic partnership has been established with Contemporary Cultural led by cultural curator Edgar Varela as well as partnerships with local art world staples; Artweek LA, LA Canvas, Flavorpill LA, KCRW & Dublab..

The Analog Gallery will ad to the important dialogue taking place in the art world and will integrate the associated entities as an important part of the life of Los Angeles culture.

Carl Ramsey was an illustrator for many years. He has always considered himself fortunate to have spent his youth in the then still semi-rural environs of southern San Diego County. At nearby Southwestern College (1964-66) he came under the guidance of an excellent art
department faculty, including the conceptual artist John Baldessari, who suggested late nights at Barney’s Beanery and classes at Chouinard Art Institute as developmental next steps.

Four years later Ramsey began a career in illustration. Advertising agencies, Motor Trend
Magazine, album cover designers, and eventually motion picture studios supplied the
assignments and tight deadlines for the next two and a half decades.
One-sheet illustrations, including the final art for Quest for Fire, One Crazy Summer, Risky Business, Police Academy 4, Return of the Living Dead and Beetlejuice, among many others, along with innumerable drawings, sketches and other paintings were produced for film releases during the 1980s and early 1990s. Included within this time span is the creation of the original poster art for the long-running musical Dreamgirls.

Since then, oil paintings of a wide range of subjects, including landscapes and portraits, have been produced. Most recent work, spanning the last ten years, consists mainly of the
interpretation of the human and architectural elements in the Historic Core and Skid Row
areas of downtown Los Angeles, where the painter lived for several years. He now resides near MacArthur Park.

These pieces evoke a time in my childhood when I lived in post-Franco Spain. In my hometown of Sevilla, the ancient walls would be covered with sheets of torn film posters. Rugged lead actors and glamorous women in suggestive poses peeked out from underneath years of layered announcements for neighborhood theaters like el cine Becquer, where I spent hours in the dark entranced by the same images displayed outside.

Here, using salvaged, vintage Italian movie posters of the 1960s and 70s, digital imagery, paints and inks, I’ve re-imagined that past and recast the characters in a violently brilliant narrative where the primal forces of femininity and masculinity clash and reassemble. The colors and textures of these pieces repeat the rich dynamic in kaleidoscopic illumination and tactile robustness.

The video work transforms that aesthetic into a more conventional, yet just as fractured narrative. Resurrecting familiar faces from the film and television screens of the 1960s and 70s, these cut-ups, much like the fine art pieces, are digitally manipulated and presented in a new context, where heroines become demons, men become anonymous, and children become scapegoats.

I hope to give the viewer the feeling that I get from creating these pieces, vibrant and exciting melodramas that played out as street art and in the movie palaces of my youth, yet imagined from the perspective of experience. For me, it is a total encounter of sight, sound, and memory.

Artist and filmmaker Michael Frost was born in Spain in 1971 and raised in Upstate New York. He took his BA in Cinema and Art History from Binghamton University and is the recipient of the 1997 Eastman Kodak Award for Film. He currently maintains a working studio in Los Angeles where he has resided since 1998.

CUT UPS:

Works by visual artist and filmmaker Michael Frost

Opens Saturday June 4th from 7-10pm
Exhibit runs June 4th to July 2nd
Gallery Hours are Wed-Sat from 12pm-6pm

Spanish Born artist Michael Frost resides in Los Angeles where he maintains a working studio and works with mixed media on large pieces on canvas. Michael is also a visual artist constantly creating film art and evolving as an artist and a filmaker. His filmmaking background can be noted in many of his works. His film company is http://www.helsinkiproductions.com/

NO FLIP FLOPS PLEASE:

Spending most of his 20’s in the jet-setter, high-fashion circles of Paris while working for Guy Bourdin as a fashion photographer and designing custom shoes for the Parisian elite, it is no surprise artist Marc Valesella’s “LEGS” series has more to with shoes than legs.

His approach to the “LEGS” series is much like Yves Saint Laurent’s view of fashion – “Fashion fades, style endures.”

Valesella explains, “Elegance is the manifestation of inner beauty. This work is an expression of my belief that elegance must be cultivated as it cannot be bought like the current fashion trend.”

As a part of the Month of Photography in Los Angeles (MOPLA), Valesella exhibits the LEGS series in a solo show at the EDGAR VARELA FINE ARTS Gallery, April 29, 2011 – May 28, 2011.

ABOUT MARC VALESELLA:

Marc Valesella (www.marcvalesella.com). His photographic endeavors start with the visualization of a beautiful print, even when taken out of the context of the series. He began his photographic career in Paris by assisting Guy Bourdin in the 1970’s. He learned black and white printing under the guidance of Jeanloup Sieff. In 1986, after Moving to Los Angeles, he started to work with large format cameras. From 1995 to present, Valesella has made extensive research on high definition printing with small and medium format cameras, using highly customized enlarging systems. Valesella’s work has been exhibited in solo shows and featured in private collections internationally. Recent photography project – photographing ancient cave drawings for the Werner Herzog film, “Cave of Forgotten Dreams”.

RECEPTION Saturday May 21th from 6-9pm
Exhibit runs April 29th to May 28st
Gallery Hours are Wed-Sat from 12pm-6pm

Edgar Varela Fine Arts
727 South Spring Street
Los Angeles, CA 90014

Edgar Varela Fine Arts is dedicated to exhibiting compelling work from exciting emerging and mid-career artists as well as providing a platform for interaction and conversation about the contemporary art world. EVFA also curates and produces relevant cultural happenings that impact the perception on traditional art roles in society. For more info: 213-604-3634, e-mail at edgar@edgarvarela.com

Free and Open to the public.Presented by:
Art Weekend LA, MOPLA (Month of Photography LA), ArtBook & DLANCRichard Misrach: An artist talk and book signing
Begins at 7:00pmRichard Misrach is one of the most influential and prolific artists of his generation. In the 1970s, he helped pioneer the renaissance of color photography and large-scale presentation that are widespread practice today. Best known for his ongoing epic series, Desert Cantos, a multi-faceted approach to the study of place and man’s complex relationship to it, he has worked in the landscape for over 40 years.

Artist will be signing copies of “Destory This Memory” immediately following the talk

Free and Open to the public.Presented by:
Art Weekend LA, MOPLA (Month of Photography LA)
Downtown Los Angeles Neighborhood CouncilAlbert Watson: An Artist Talk and Book Signing
Begins at 7:00pmAlbert Watson (born 1942) is a Scottish photographer well known for his fashion, celebrity and art photography, and whose work is featured in galleries and museums worldwide. He has shot over 200 covers of Vogue around the world and 40 covers of Rolling Stone magazine since the mid-1970s. Photo District News named Watson one of the 20 most influential photographers of all time, along with Richard Avedon and Irving Penn, among others. Watson has won numerous honors, including a Lucie Award, a Grammy Award, the Hasselblad Masters Award, three ANDY Awards, and the Centenary Medal, a lifetime achievement award from the Royal Photographic Society.

Artist will be signing copies of “UFO” and “Strip Search” directly following the talk. Pre-purchase books at mopla.org

Born in France -1955. Received a bachelor degree in mechanical engineering from the ‘Institut Universitaire de Technologie’ Paris, France(1977). An autodidact at photography. Started taking pictures in 1975 while working for Guy Bourdin in Paris. Learned black and white printing from 1977-1979 under the guidance of Jean Loup Sieff, also in Paris.

Moved to Los Angeles in 1986 and started to work with large format cameras. From 1995 to present, made extensive research on high definition printing with small and medium format cameras, using highly customized enlarging systems. Resides in Los Angeles. Working between Los Angeles and Paris.

Please join Edition One Hundred next Wednesday night for our pop-up event hosted by Edgar Varela Fine Arts & Cultural Events. This event will go through to Thursday night during Downtown LA Art Walk. Edition One Hundred will show and sell all prints to date in a pop-up event at Edgar Varela Fine Arts from Wednesday, April 13th, 7pm to 10pm through Thursday, April 14th, 6pm – 11pm.

All Edition One Hundred series prints will be available for purchase for $100.00.

About Edition One Hundred

Designed to provide beautifully produced art and photography at prices within reach, Edition One Hundred is a gallery without walls; open twenty-four hours a day in any time zone around the globe. Each artist’s work is printed in an exclusive edition of 100. With rare exceptions, each print sells for $100. All prints are signed by the artist and come with a certificate of authenticity. Edition One Hundred will contribute 10% from the sale of every print to the charity or cause of each artist’s choosing.

Based online at www.editiononehundred.com, this gallery uses innovations in technology to produce and distribute high quality fine art prints to a new generation of collectors.

Most of my photographic endeavors start with the excitement of the visualization of a beautiful print, even when taken out of the context of the series. By that I mean that the political or social content of a given body of work should not be used as a palliative for a beautiful image, no matter how interesting the subject is.

While all the serious talk about a photographer motive is important, a fine print has a life of its own and should be an object of itself. The emotions of the viewers when confronted to my work are always more important to me than any message I ultimately try to send.

In the medium of photography, the public seems to believe that the technical recipes are more important than of other mediums, and so they may be, however, it is not of great interest to be explained. My technical relationship with my work is very simple in that I am a practitioner of straight photography using available light and the least manipulation in the darkroom as possible.

Born in France -1955. Received a bachelor degree in mechanical engineering from the ‘Institut Universitaire de Technologie’ Paris, France(1977). An autodidact at photography. Started taking pictures in 1975 while working for Guy Bourdin in Paris. Learned black and white printing from 1977-1979 under the guidance of Jean Loup Sieff, also in Paris.

Moved to Los Angeles in 1986 and started to work with large format cameras. From 1995 to present, made extensive research on high definition printing with small and medium format cameras, using highly customized enlarging systems. Resides in Los Angeles. Working between Los Angeles and Paris.